Observable Universe
by avocadomoon
Summary: Somebody's been summoning ghosts in the attic. [for klutzy girl, chocobox 2019]


Somebody's been summoning ghosts in the attic. They've been hiding it well, whoever it is, but Paige can tell. She's started keeping a log of potion ingredients ever since Chris arrived and started helping himself to their supplies (so sue her, she's paranoid - what else is she supposed to do with all her free time, now that she's got so much of it?) and she's noticed which herbs get mysteriously replenished. The candles too, seem shorter, though she can't be positive about that. (Now keeping track of candle lengths - that would be _really_ crazy. Ha.)

About three weeks before Samhain, she confirms it: whoever it is forgets to restock the sage bundles before she notices, and leaves the candlesticks arranged in the summoning circle - they must've been in a hurry, that time.

It could be Piper or Phoebe, talking to Grams or their mother, but Paige doubts it - all of them try to limit their use of that spell, for a whole multitude of reasons both magical and emotional. And besides - this close to Samhain, the spell would be unpredictable, anyway. No - it has to be Chris. The extra ingredients he's been using - catnip, of all things? And _rock salt?_ \- must mean an alteration of some kind to the basic summoning of the dead spell that they've always used - and it's not one that's in the Book, Paige has already checked. And there must be some reason why he has to do it at the Manor - it's not like you can't do a simple summoning spell anywhere else - so the Nexus has to be necessary, somehow. Confronting him directly won't get her anywhere, so Paige finds herself at an impasse.

If she goes to her sisters, they'll think the worst, and Paige knows it. Chris has been on thin ice with them - Phoebe especially - since the ugly episode with Bianca, and the revelations she brought with her. Chris has been even more quiet and withdrawn than usual - understandably, if he was telling the truth about his fiance's death - but it hasn't helped his case as far as proving his character to Paige's tense, suspicious sisters. Their protective instincts are on overdrive anyway with the mysterious threat to Wyatt, but with each secret, each lie that Chris hands over, without any visible remorse, they seem to tighten up more and more. Paige is worried that if she presses the wrong button, it'll all explode.

That's not even touching the _Leo issue_ \- Paige gets a headache just thinking about _his_ reaction. Jeez.

As far as Paige herself - she's torn. She wants to believe - truly, deep down in her heart - that Chris' intentions are good. She's pretty certain that they are, and that most of their conflict really comes from her family's distaste for lying (Paige can sympathize, but as a seasoned bullshitter herself, she's come up against that brick wall a time or two in the past few years) and Chris' unmovable stubbornness, more than strong enough to stand up against the Halliwells'. Part personality, part situation - she really doesn't think he's evil, by any means. A bit traumatized - certainly. Morally grey, at some points - sure. But evil? No. Paige can't see it. And she's sure nobody else really thinks that, either.

But the point remains - he's summoning ghosts in the attic. She may believe him, but belief and unconditional trust are two different things. Paige is optimistic, but not stupid. He's just a kid, after all. She's not sure her sisters remember that all the time - just a twenty-three year old kid.

A scary, very powerful twenty-three year old, granted. But Paige didn't even know how to do her taxes until she was at _least_ twenty-five. So 'kid' still feels fitting, despite everything.

It's the rock salt that makes her nervous, to be honest. A purifying element - _who_ in the hell is he summoning? Paige sets up a subtle monitoring spell - the most unobtrusive one she can come up with - and waits to catch him in the act, praying that it's nothing _too_ terrible. Something she could defend, at the very least. A dead person who just really liked seasoning, or something.

A girl can hope.

If she'd had to guess, she would've thought he was doing it at night, but it's actually in the very early hours of the morning - just barely five AM - that her monitoring spell goes off. Paige grumbles her way out of bed, cursing his ingenuity - nobody in this house is a morning person. Stupidly clever, sneaky-ass Whitelighter.

The house is quiet, for once. Wyatt is sleeping through the night - finally - and Piper has taken full advantage, hitting the sheets early and sleeping in late, whenever she can (Paige doesn't blame her). Phoebe is almost completely moved out, but she still sleeps at the Manor on Sundays, helping Piper with Wyatt. Paige herself only sleeps there when Richard is out of town - so who even knows how long he's been getting away with this - months, maybe.

Paige tiptoes her way up to the attic - avoiding the creaky steps by memory - and pauses just outside the door, pressing her ear to the frame. He must have some kind of noise-dampening spell in place, because all she hears is dead, empty silence - but she knows he's in there, moving around. She can see the flicker of candlelight through the gap underneath the door.

Crouching down on her knees, Paige whispers a cancellation spell as quietly as she can. "Indulge this witch so paranoid," she hisses, struggling for a rhyme, "and render this noise spell null and void."

She winces; not her best effort. But it works, nonetheless: a subtle pressure in the air loosens, like the press of a storm cloud finally lifting, and the noise from the attic filters gently back in. Paige grins to herself, and presses her ear back to the door. She just wants to know what he's up to, that's all. This isn't weird and intrusive, she tells herself - it's _her_ attic, after all. Sort of.

There are two voices that Paige can make out - Chris', distinct and familiar to her, and a second - a woman's voice. The ghost, presumably. Paige frowns, trying to make out specific words, but it's still too quiet. They must be over in the far end of the room - too far from the door for Paige to hear.

Biting her lip, Paige reaches up and eases the door open, praying it doesn't squeak. She only dares to open it a few inches, but immediately the sound becomes clearer - Chris, his voice thin and tired, speaking in an intent tone, just on the edge of distress. But then again - that's how Chris sounds all the time, nowadays.

" - what else I can do about it, for the time being. They're never going to trust me while I'm still lying to them, and I can't tell them the truth, so what's the alternative? Lie more? Make up some wild story to get them to feel sorry for me?"

That's definitely Chris. Paige holds her breath; this is definitely the juicy stuff she was looking for.

"You've been here for almost a year now," comes the answer. Paige doesn't recognize the voice - soothing and calm, with an undertone of authority. A young woman's voice. The fiance? "At a certain point, it's going to become unmanageable, on _several_ levels, Chris. Unless your plan all along was to prevent your own birth, in which case I'm going to kill you myself! And then when you get to the spiritual plane, I'll kill you _again _\- and remember, I'm immortal, buddy! I can do it over and over and over again until I'm satisfied you get the point."

"Is that how you spend your time when you're dead?" Chris asks, sounding amused and not even the least bit intimidated. "Just mock-killing everyone you don't like, over and over?"

"It does have a certain appeal, trust me," comes the dark reply. Paige frowns again; there's something...familiar, about the woman's voice. It has to be a family member of his, or at least a friend - in which case she's not going to begrudge him for calling home every once in awhile - but it pricks at the edges of Paige's memory. Like an actress she's seen in a movie somewhere, but she can't place the name.

"I'm still planning on being born, don't worry," Chris says. "I'm kind of hoping that will happen on its own, and I won't even have to _think _about it. But if I can pull this off without ever having to tell them about...don't tell me you _disagree_? I won't do that to them - I can't. They can hate me all they want and it'd still be the better option."

"Better for Wyatt, maybe," the voice replies - gentle, concerned. Paige's heart twinges a little, at the love she can hear in the soft words. Like a wire that's been stripped and exposed to open air. "But what about you? You have to grow up in this house too, Chris. Do you really think it's better for them to realize it slowly, as you grow up? That's a lonely, scary childhood you're condemning yourself to, sweetheart."

Paige's breath freezes in her throat. What? No. No way. It can't be -

"They wouldn't treat me any differently," Chris says, his voice thin again, scraped raw. "She's a good mother - the _best_ \- she wouldn't - "

"She's human," the voice interrupts, "and you're shooting yourself in the foot, when you push them away. If you let them think the worst of you, then of course they _will._ You deserve to be saved too, Chris. And your life isn't over yet, honey - not by a long shot."

Paige covers her mouth with one hand, tears welling up behind her eyes. _Oh God._ Her pulse jumps in her throat as the last eight months suddenly _shift,_ like words suddenly coming into focus beneath a pair of eyeglasses. Everything makes sense, now. Of course he's a Halliwell. _Chris Halliwell._

Her throat burns with shame and anger and a million other things on top, but she pushes it down, keeping her palm pressed tightly against her lips. They're still talking; she _has _to keep listening.

" - it matters. None of it matters, anymore." That's Chris, mumbling - almost too quiet for Paige to hear. She nudges the door open a few centimeters more, her hands shaking.

"That's not true. Don't lose it on me now, Chris."

"I'm not losing it!" Chris says, louder now. He sounds offended. "But don't stand there and lecture me about _valuing my own life_ when you knew very well what the endgame was, from the very beginning. You were the one who explained to me in the first place!"

"That doesn't mean - you're misunderstanding me."

"And you're underestimating me," Chris says, bitterly. "_Again_. Not that I'm not used to it."

"Oh come on," the ghost says, sounding exasperated. "Gimme a little credit - I'm not your father, Chris."

"Then stop acting like him, _Aunt Prue_," Chris spits, somehow turning the name into a sneering insult. Paige gasps, her heart skipping a beat at the name, and loses her balance at the same time, tumbling forward from her crouch at the door. She catches herself on the doorframe, stopping herself from falling down the steps at the last second, but - the door swings open wider, and she winces, scrambling quickly to her feet. Gig's up.

"Was that - " the woman - Prue, holy mother of God, he's talking to _Prue_ \- says, but before the sentence even finishes, the door slams all the way open, hitting the wall of the attic with a sharp crack. Paige jumps, despite herself, and straightens up the rest of the way, putting on her fiercest glare, but - to her surprise, and faint alarm, Chris doesn't look angry. Instead, his face is stricken - almost scared. Paige takes a step back, surprised.

"Paige," Chris says, his hand still outstretched, and - again, surprisingly, his face relaxes, like he's relieved. "Jesus Christ. Were you _eavesdropping?_"

"I - " Paige says, her voice catching in her throat. Just beyond Chris, a woman stands in the middle of the summoning circle, faint and toned with grey like a spirit. But her eyes - pale, forest green, almost grey - are in piercing color. Paige stares at her for a long moment, her words deserting her. Prue Halliwell. Her third sister.

For once, she can't think of a single thing to say.

"Hello," Prue says. Paige just keeps staring, stricken with silence. Prue smiles at her gently. "Chris, you might have to help her out."

"Paige." Chris moves into her line of sight, closer than she thought he was - Paige jumps again, startled. Chris doesn't react, touching her shoulder cautiously. "Are you okay? Do you need to sit down?"

"I - _no,_" Paige says, shocked back into coherence. "What am I, eighty? I'm just - " she blinks up at Chris, and then reaches out with one fist and punches him in the chest. Hard. He staggers back a step, scowling. "What the _fuck_, Chris?"

"Jesus," Chris complains again, rubbing the spot she'd hit. "Take it easy, Paige, for God's sake - "

"_No_ I will not take it easy! You - you're - " Paige stammers, the magnitude of what she's just discovered starting to sink in. "You're…"

"Yeah," Chris says shortly, obviously resigned. The attic door swings shut with another wave of his hand, the noise spell dropping back down too with a brief press of air that ruffles the end of Paige's ponytail. She has a mere second to be impressed with his wordless magic before her attention is caught again by Prue, watching them quietly from the circle, her face sympathetic and distant. "What else did you overhear?"

"I heard - " Paige takes a step forward, hesitantly. "You. I heard you, Prue."

Prue smiles at her again. Her hair is darker than Piper's or Phoebe's, falling in dark, inky black waves down past her shoulders. She's wearing some kind of pantsuit, with a dark brown blazer, and a thin necklace of blue stones. And she looks so much like Paige did, when she was younger. Paige has a brief moment of vertigo, like she's looking into a strange, otherworldly mirror. The same eyes, the same nose. The same coloring - she's even got those chunky bangs that Paige painfully maintained for almost ten years. It's eerie.

"It's nice to finally meet you," Prue says, warm and yet - still somehow removed, a thin layer of grey separating her from the reality of the rest of the room. "Wow. You look...so much like Mom. Even more than they said."

"They?" Paige repeats stupidly, then winces. She's imagined this moment so many times, it's hard to believe that it's actually happening. "I mean - it's - it's nice to meet you too. I have - I've wanted to talk to you for a really long time, I'm just - wow." She winces again, at her own stammering, glancing over at Chris self-consciously. But he's retreated, a few steps away, his face turned downward. As if giving her privacy. "You - Piper and Phoebe said they couldn't summon you! Are you...from the future too? Somehow?"

"Not really." Prue's face shifts, her form flickering a little at the edges. Paige feels Chris moving up to her side again. "Chris can explain it a bit better. But later - I don't have much time left."

"I've said everything I needed to," Chris says, a bit darkly. Prue's expression shifts again, this time into sadness. "This changes things, though. I'll summon you again next month, I promise."

"I'll hold you to that," Prue says gravely, then moves her eyes back to Paige. "I'm sorry we don't have more time. I've wanted to speak to you for a long, long time as well, Paige."

"What? But - " Paige looks between the two of them, a little frantic from the finality of that. "What do you mean, you don't have time? You can't stay and talk - even just a little? What about Piper and - "

Paige's sentence is lost to a gasp, as Prue's spirit flickers again, like an old movie tape running off its wheel. When she coalesces again, she's wearing different clothes - a long sundress, with her hair pulled back into a bun. She also looks about ten years younger. Paige blinks at her in surprise.

"A few more minutes, maybe," Prue says, to Chris. She winces. "I'll try to hold on as long as I can."

"What is this?" Paige asks, lost. Chris just shakes his head.

"I'll explain later, I promise," he says quickly. "You heard her - just a few minutes. Use them, Paige."

Paige looks back at Prue, her heart pounding wildly. There's just - there's too much. Too much to say and ask, she doesn't even know where to begin. Her heart feels stuck in her throat - a hard lump, cutting off her tongue.

"It's alright," Prue says softly, flickering at the edges again. Her eyes close briefly, and she seems to get a little more solid for a brief moment, before fading again. "It's alright, I already know everything you're thinking, Paige. Because I think all of that too. We'll have time - just not right now. We'll have all the time in the world, one day. You don't have to be afraid."

"But - " Paige shakes her head, her tears spilling over. "What does that matter to me _now?_ We need you _now,_ in _this_ life, Prue. There's so much I want to ask you, so much you could teach me - "

"We can try," Prue says, flickering again. This time, when she reappears, she's old - grey in her hair, a blue shawl around her shoulders. Paige moves back, running into Chris, standing right behind her. He puts his hands on her shoulders, steadying her. "I'm sorry, I can't hold onto it. She's too strong. Chris - " She flickers again, reappearing again as a young woman - her hair short, curly at the nape of her neck, jeans and a t-shirt. Paige shivers at the frantic look on her face. "Chris - don't forget what I said - please, _please_ think about it, sweetheart, _please_ \- " She flickers again, stuttering violently. Paige covers her mouth with her hand again, her heart aching.

"We love you," Chris says, enunciating the words like he's speaking to someone far away. "We love you, Prue. We'll find you again."

"I - " Prue says, a wisp of a word, and then she's gone. The candles snuff out all at once, the attic plunged into darkness - the rising sun outside the thick glass the only dim source of light.

Paige chokes on a sob, covering her eyes with both hands. It's just so unfair, she thinks. Just a bare, few minutes - a few sentences - and that's it? What about _Piper and Phoebe?_ God, they'll never forgive her -

The candles relight all at once, and Paige jerks her face up, still jittery from adrenaline, but - it's just Chris. Standing there sheepishly, avoiding her eyes. A wave of sudden anger dissolves the lump in Paige's throat, turning it to ash.

"So," he says, straightening his shoulders. Lifting up his chin, ready to take it. Paige glares at him. She really, really wants to hit him again. "Do you need a few minutes or do you want to rip me a new one now? I only ask because I could really use some coffee, so if you're going to wait, I might as well go put on a pot - "

Paige orbs one of the candlesticks at his head. Chris ducks just in time, turning to look as it crashes against the side of the wall, spattering hot wax on one of the curtains, the holder leaving an ugly dent in the wood.

"Are you nuts?" Chris exclaims. "That was lit - you could've burned the house down!"

"Shut up," Paige says fiercely, holding out her hand again threateningly. Chris winces, and falls silent. "Just - just shut up. For one second, just. Don't. Talk."

Chris nods, crossing his arms across his chest. Paige stares at him, her chest heaving, seeing him for the first time: the similarities, and the differences. Clicking it into place in her head.

Same eyes, same nose. Same spirit. She feels pretty stupid, that she couldn't see it on her own: Chris Halliwell.

Slowly, she lets her hand fall. She sees his shoulders relax minutely in response, and for some reason - that bothers her. She looks past his shoulder to see the broken candle on the floor, and her anger turns to shame.

"Shit," she says, hissing her breath out through her teeth. "Shit."

Chris doesn't say anything - still watching her warily. Paige feels her own shoulders slump, suddenly tired. God. Whatever the hell she was expecting to find out, it wasn't _this._

"Coffee," she says finally, breaking the tense silence. "Let's - let's get coffee. We need to talk."

Chris nods, still not saying anything. Paige swallows down her embarrassment at the earlier temper tantrum - no matter how deserved it was - and tries for normal.

"But not here," she says. "Let's go - "

"Not in public," Chris mutters, finally speaking. Paige rolls her eyes at him.

"Of course not," she says, shaking her head. "Richard's in New York visiting family. We can go there."

Chris' face looks sullen, but he doesn't protest. "He's got food available at all hours, I assume? A maid service, cleaning staff, all that?"

Paige snorts. "He's a _magical_ millionaire, Chris," she says. "His coffee maker turns itself on."

"Small wonders," Chris mutters.

* * *

Paige freaks out while she gets dressed, and then freaks out some more as she orbs out of the Manor like a big fat coward, avoiding Piper and Phoebe. She can hear them starting to wake up - Wyatt babbling loudly from Piper's room, Phoebe's music playing softly in the upstairs bathroom as she gets ready to shower - and Paige tiptoes around her room, feeling like she did when she first moved in a few years back, when she was so scared of pissing them off that she tried to make herself as unobtrusive and inoffensive as possible. (Which lasted about...a week and a half.)

Chris had orbed away before she'd even left the attic, and half of her thinks that he might stand her up, but - thankfully, he's already there, flipping through Richard's library, when she orbs in. He doesn't look up at her entrance, but his shoulders tense up again. Paige's stomach sinks.

"I haven't done anything about coffee," he says, still intent on the book in his hands. "I didn't know where the kitchen was, so I figured I'd just wait for you."

"I'll take care of it," Paige says softly. It's starting to feel real - the knowledge curdling in her stomach. This is her blood, her family. Not_ her_ son - definitely not, she can tell that just by looking at him - but Piper's. Her nephew, who's gripping that book with white knuckles, looking like he's about to face the battle of his life. She hurries into the kitchen before she starts to do something stupid, like hug him, or start crying again.

She makes two cups of black coffee - Chris is the only one who takes it like she does, strong and plain - and carries them back out into the living room, bracing herself as she goes. Chris has moved to the table, the book still in his hands - an alchemist handbook, the one that Richard refers to a lot when he's cooking. He's got it flipped open to the section on medicinal herbs and poultices, flat open on the table.

"I've never seen a copy of this in real life before," he comments casually, finally - _finally_ \- looking up at her as she sets the mug next to his arm. Paige raises an eyebrow at him, asking without asking. "Bradford Willoughby - the author - he was an alchemist in the 1900s, in northern Utah. This text set the standard - but all the copies were gone, in my time." He looks back down at the book, his face wry. "The rarest of the rare, right here in my hands. This would be worth a fortune where I come from."

"I think Richard got that at that used Wiccan bookstore in the Haight," Paige says. "Cost him maybe thirty bucks."

Chris laughs, to Paige's surprise. He flips the cover shut with one hand, reaching out for the coffee with his other. "Figures."

Paige takes a bracing sip from her own mug, trying to come up with a good opening line. But for once, her wit has deserted her. "You're Piper's, aren't you," she says, watching his reaction closely. But he doesn't have one - he just drinks his coffee, his face carved from stone. "I know you're not mine. Not that I wouldn't want you to be mine, but - you'd have been conceived around this time, right? And Richard and I aren't going to have kids together." The honesty hurts, a little, but Paige is over the phase of her life where every man she meets needs to be _the one._ She knows what it is, for now. "And those Leo issues of yours - that's just good old fashioned daddy issues, isn't it? I should've known."

Chris sighs, shaking his head. "Crass as always, Aunt Paige."

Paige feels an eerie little thrill, hearing that. "A_ha!_ So I _didn't_ die when the Titans attacked - you knew me! I _knew _it."

Chris rolls his eyes. "You _did_ die, when the Titans attacked," he says. "I never said nobody brought you back, though."

"Ooh." Paige narrows her eyes at him. "You sneaky little shit," she says.

Chris shrugs. "I did what I had to. The first time around a lot more people died. And Meta survived the battle, as well - it was almost five years before she was finally defeated." He pauses, his face creasing with some unknown memory. "A _lot_ of people died."

Paige sobers beneath the gravity of his honesty, shivering a little. "That's not the only thing you came back to prevent, though," she says, needlessly. "There's something else. Something specifically about Wyatt."

"I can't tell you," Chris says immediately. "But you can ask. I'll answer what I can."

Paige bites her lip. She wants to ask about Prue - so _badly_ wants to ask about Prue - but she owes Piper and Leo this, first. "Wyatt's your older brother."

"Yes." Chris nods. His hands tighten around his mug, but Paige can't see any other reaction - no expression on his face, not even a twitch. Like a soldier, she thinks, with a deep, grim chill.

"And _you_ know what it is," she prods. Chris doesn't move. "You know exactly what it is, but you think telling us would...hurt us, somehow."

Chris loosens his hands, raising one in a _well, yeah_ sort of gesture. But he still doesn't say anything.

"But you don't know how to stop it," Paige finishes. She reaches out and slowly - telegraphing her movements, like she used to do with the young, abused kids who would come through her office - touches his arm. He pulls it away almost immediately, sitting back in his chair, out of her reach. Like the kids she used to work with - Paige doesn't feel offended. The gesture is what matters - he can decide whether or not to accept it. "Jesus, kid. You didn't make it easy on yourself, did you?"

Chris seems to fight with himself for a long second, the struggle plain on his face. "Would you have believed me, if I introduced myself like that? 'Hi, I'm your son.' No - of course not."

Paige just shakes her head. They'll have time to argue the specifics later. Hopefully. "Sending Leo away, though - working with demons - "

"I did what I had to," Chris repeats, stone cold and heavy.

Paige nods, taking another drink as she recalculates. She won't get anywhere if she keeps pushing, she knows. He's waiting for her to get confrontational, so he can react with anger and cut the conversation off at the knees. She knows that tactic in and out - it's her favorite one to use with Piper, because it works every damn time.

No wonder none of them saw it - he's been using their own tactics against them, this whole time.

"You know I'm gonna tell them," Paige says, setting her mug down carefully on the table. "You can't ask me not to."

"No, you're not," Chris says calmly, like he was ready for it. Paige sits back in her chair, expecting this, but still taken aback by his firmness, all the same. "Because if you tell Piper who I am before she and Leo conceive me, you'll take the chance of erasing my existence altogether. Which will then erase everything that I've changed here, in the past. And you don't want to do that."

Paige gulps her coffee again, scrambling for a counter argument. But - well, that's a pretty good point. A pretty hard-to-argue-with point. "If I tell just Piper, and not Leo - I mean, she could still...you know…"

Chris levels her with a look. "Call her estranged husband down for a booty call so she can strategically get herself knocked up? Paige. Come on."

Paige sputters. "You really don't mince words, do ya," she says, shaking her head. Chris smirks, but without humor. "Phoebe then," she blurts. "Let me tell Pheebs - she'll see the logic, and - "

"Pheebs can't keep a secret from Piper to save her life," Chris says, shaking his head. "No, Paige. You know now, and I can't change that. But it's too risky. You've time traveled before - you all have. You should know the rules. Every little thing changes something. Every _single word_ I say is a risk."

Paige's first instinct is disdain, but she's caught short by the look on his face - desperation, lurking quietly beneath the mask of calm. Paige readjusts, once again, thinking about that day that Bianca had come - the look on his face, when he'd stepped back through the portal. That empty, gnawing grief that rolled off of him in devastating waves.

"Fine. Fine, okay," Paige says, taking a deep breath. Chris watches her calmly, waiting for her next question. "Okay. So tell me about Prue."

"Prue." Chris flexes his hands, cracking one of his knuckles. "Yeah. I'm sorry about that. Really, I am."

Paige nods, clasping her hands together around her mug, so he won't see them shake.

"What you saw…" Chris winces. "Wasn't her spirit. It's hard to explain, but…"

"She kept...changing," Paige says, haltingly. The different appearances - different ages - were nothing like any spirit Paige has ever seen before. "Is she not...a normal ghost?"

"No." Chris leans forward, mirroring her position with his own coffee cup. "She's not a ghost at all. Like I said, it's hard to explain." He trails off momentarily, and Paige lets it sit for a moment, letting him gather his thoughts. "Okay, so - you went to college, right? You probably learned something about Schrodinger's cat, right?"

"The cat is in the box and not in the box at the same time, that shit?" Paige asks, incredulously. "What does that have to do with Prue?"

"I'm getting there," Chris says, holding up a hand. "It's not actually about a cat. It's a thought experiment, to try and illustrate a phenomenon in quantum physics. It's something that they've actually seen and proved - or will, at some point in the near future." Chris shrugs. "Either way. Subatomic particles - the stuff inside atoms, that make up protons and neutrons - will change their behavior based on whether they're being observed or not. It's one of the weirder aspects of quantum physics - that matter can actually be affected _physically_ by someone watching it."

"Okay," Paige says slowly, still a little lost as to the direction of this sidetrack.

"So, time travel is very similar," Chris says. Paige smiles a little, at the sudden energy in his voice. It's cute, somehow, in a weird way. "The sequence of events - the 'timeline' - is incredibly sensitive, especially when magicals are involved. Sometimes just the act of _thinking_ about a time travel spell is enough to affect events that have already happened. And time itself - the nature of it - is much more complicated than a straight line from A to B. It's more like a lake - a really deep body of water, with thousands of ripples and waves constantly crashing into each other. And us? You and me, sitting here right now? We're just one of those ripples." Chris tilts his coffee mug, shaking it slightly so the liquid splashes dangerously close to the side of the cup. "We live through time the way we do because it's the only way that we, as humans, are capable of seeing it. We live life in four dimensions - but in reality, there's actually more like _eleven._ We just can't see them, or process them."

"And time travel is a way of...seeing those extra dimensions?" Paige asks, frowning. She's beginning to get a headache again.

"Exactly," Chris says. "A lot of magic is just the ability to move in those extra dimensions, the ones we can't always see. That's what orbing is. Shimmering, and blinking. Teleportation, astral projection...telekinesis. Mortals can't interact with those extra dimensions at all, but - us, witches and demons and Whitelighters and whatever - our powers dip into those spaces all the time. We just don't know we're doing it."

"I feel like we should be smoking a bowl right now," Paige says dryly.

"Don't tempt me," Chris shoots back, without even skipping a beat. Paige nearly chokes on her coffee. "So anyway. That's part of why what I'm trying to do here is so dangerous - it's one of the most unpredictable forms of magic. The slightest, tiniest thing could have a ripple effect, and - " Chris lets his mug fall back to the table, the coffee splashing over the side and leaving a small stain on the tablecloth. "Well, you get the idea."

"Alright," Paige says, "and Prue is not a ghost, somehow, because…?"

"Because she's another ripple," Chris says. He grimaces. "I told you it's hard to explain. She's...an advisor. A sort of...amalgam of Prue. Does that make sense?"

"No," Paige says flatly.

"Right." Chris folds his hands together on the table. "So Bianca and I…" he pauses, visibly gathering his courage. "When we were planning this, we needed...intel. We knew a bit about this time period, the things that happened to you all during these couple of years, but it was all secondhand, from stories, or rumors...stuff like that. We needed exact details in order to pull this off - if the attic would be empty on this specific Tuesday, what rooms everyone was in, names of specific demons you fought, the kinds of cars you drove, that kind of stuff. We didn't want to go into it without a...game plan. At least some kind of rough plot, things we could change, that would hopefully…" Chris swallows thickly. "Yeah. Change _everything._"

Paige finds herself holding her breath, considering for the first time what it must have been like - the lead up to a move like this. What it must have taken, for Chris to plan all this out, and then actually _do it._ "So Prue, or this...this version of Prue - she helped?"

"Yes. It's a variation of the spell to summon a spirit, but instead of summoning a ghost, it summons...a version of Prue from one of those extra dimensions." Chris falters. "That still doesn't really explain it. The Prue you met - she's a combination of lots of different Prues. From timelines that went bad, and good, and everything in-between. She knows pretty much...everything about the _possibilities._ That's why I keep summoning her to talk - she's been indispensable, so far."

Paige isn't quite sure about that - from what she'd overheard, it sounded more like a therapy session. But whatever - she's not going to waste time on poking him. "So there are...other timelines? Like alternate universes?"

"Oh yeah. Thousands - millions, maybe. The Prue that I summoned - she's sort of a ghost, in that all those versions of Prue are now dead. But still - not really. It's more like she's a...composite."

"That is…" Paige feels a little sick. "That's. That's something."

Chris looks unrepentant. "I know it's a lot to take in. I'm sorry."

Paige rubs her forehead with one hand, trying to process it. "And this is a spell you found in the future? This is something that people...can _do_?"

"No. Bianca created the spell." Chris' face goes grave again. "We had to focus on a specific person, and I chose Prue. So that's my fault." He looks her in the eye, deliberately. "But Bianca came up with it. She was...a physics major, you know." His hands tighten on the mug again. "Quantum physics. She was a genius - sped through high school in three years, got her bachelor's in two. She would've changed the world, if it hadn't changed on its own, first."

Paige swallows down her own emotion, reaching out again. This time, Chris lets her touch him: leaves his arm still, allowing her hand to rest for a moment on his wrist. Just a little gesture, across a wide, wide chasm.

"So," Paige says quietly, "it's not really _our_ Prue. It's Prue, but...not the one we lost."

"No." Chris looks sympathetic. "The Prue of this timeline...nobody's ever been able to summon her. I don't know why." He pauses for a moment. "My mother tried many, many times. Nobody's ever been able to explain it."

Paige pulls her hand back, and lays both her palms flat on the table. Thinks about that day she saw her parents again - those brief few moments, given as a gift from the Elders. At the time, it'd made perfect sense - big strong angels in the sky, doling out blessings from up above. Now, with all that she knows about the Elders - their failings, their mortalities - it just pisses her off. The more she learns about how the universe makes sense, the more she realizes that it doesn't, not even a little bit.

"We cheat all the time, don't we?" Paige asks rhetorically. "We summon our dead loved ones, we skip around the world in the blink of an eye. And when something goes wrong, we say a poem out loud and reverse it." She takes a deep breath. "So I assume you don't want me to tell the others about this, either."

Chris is quiet for a long, extended moment. "I think," he says haltingly, "that that's your decision, in the end." He opens his mouth again, then closes it, visibly struggling for words. It's a rare sight, for Chris. "She's your sister. I'm not going to tell you what to do."

Paige scoffs. Aside from dropping this in her lap and turning her entire world upside down - he's not gonna tell her what to do. Such a gentleman.

(_Definitely_ a Halliwell.)

"You said 'next month,'" Paige says, still running the implications over in her head. Trying to imagine the conversation with Piper and Phoebe - trying to explain this, without skimming too close to Chris' secrets - it's an uphill task, to say the least. "Can you only summon her at certain times?"

"The magic is based on star charts," Chris says. He shrugs. "Bianca told me how it worked...once. Then I had to take a nap afterwards." He grins sheepishly, and Paige is reminded again of his age. There are college students that are older than he is, she thinks. Children, who have never even seen their own world, let alone multiple other ones. "I have her notes if you want to look at them, but - yeah, there are only certain days when we can do the spell successfully. The next one is in a few weeks - just after Samhain."

"And I destabilized it," Paige says, completing his earlier thought. "By coming into the room - by observing her - I made her change."

"Your magic did, yes," Chris says. "It's a very sensitive spell." He pauses. "I can teach it to you. So you can do it, after I'm…"

"Gone," Paige finishes. She waits for him to protest, but he doesn't. So she hits him again.

"Ouch!" Chris exclaims, yanking his arm off the table. "You have a real problem, do you know that?"

"If this whole thing was just a drawn out suicide mission then _you're_ the one with the problem, pal," Paige says, wagging her finger in his face. "Besides, I'm your aunt now - I just discovered. That means I can hit you whenever I want."

"Jesus, no it _doesn't,_" Chris says, eyeing her warily. "It means the exact opposite, I'm pretty sure."

"Not in _this_ family," Paige says archly. She pokes at him again, this time with her foot, until he scowls at her - the playful one, that he pulls out sometimes when they bicker. She used to think he was hiding something with the way he egged her on, but now she realizes - maybe that was a bit of his real personality peeking through. Maybe that's just how he always talked to his Aunt Paige - like an annoying friend that you like despite how much they bug you. The thought makes her feel a little...warm, in an embarrassing way. That's exactly the type of aunt she aims to be. "Besides. Now you have _me._ Just right away - that puts you ahead of the game. Your survival chances just shot up a couple hundred percentage points, kiddo."

Chris blinks at her, looking unimpressed. "If you call me 'kiddo' ever again," he says, "I'm going to tell Piper that you were the one who broke her cold brew maker. And I mean that, Paige."

Paige gasps in offense. "You _wouldn't._"

"You have _no_ idea what I'm capable of," Chris threatens, smirking at his coffee mug. The thing is, Paige really believes him.

* * *

Paige is actually quite good at keeping secrets, as opposed to her sisters, who are absolutely terrible. (Chris was spot on, in his assessment of Pheebs: she actually starts sweating, when she tries to lie about anything. It's a goddamn miracle they've kept their covers in the mortal world this long, if you ask Paige.) This is partly because she grew up as the only child of aging, overprotective parents, and partly because she's a trained social worker who spent most of her twenties wrangling dysfunctional families and government office politics.

She keeps it subtle: little comments here and there, gentle rebukes whenever Phoebe says something a little too dismissive or cutting about Chris. With Piper, she broaches the topic of Leo in fits and spurts - at first, just mentioning him, bringing him up occasionally when it feels natural. Then, slowly, as Piper's ice starts to thaw - Paige starts hinting. Not obviously - she _hopes._ But over wine at night and coffee in the morning, slowly, bit by bit, her badass big sister starts to open up and actually - gasp - _talk_ about her _feelings._ Paige feels very proud, of both of them.

She doesn't dare try it with Leo - he'd see through her in a hot second - but the first time she catches him lingering in the kitchen after dinner, long after Wyatt's gone to bed, watching Piper in the garden - she takes the chance.

"You know," she says, hanging off the door frame, mock-whispering, "there's this thing called a 'door.' It allows you to leave one room and enter another, and you know...talk to whoever might be in that other place. Just saying."

Leo straightens up like he's been caught, hastily putting the dirty water glass into the dishwasher. "Thanks, Paige," he says wryly. He sneaks one last glance at Piper, obliviously picking some night-bloom jasmine on the other side of the windows. "She doesn't wanna talk to me right now. But thanks."

"You never know until you try," Paige says, with an exaggerated shrug, and bounces away, leaving him to it. _Subtle, subtle, subtle,_ she reminds herself, and only barely contains her fist pump the next morning, when she sees them both at the kitchen table, talking quietly over tea.

"Did he spend the night?" Chris demands, later that morning in the attic. He's been teaching her spells - whichever ones she can pry out of him, new ones that don't exist yet. Paige has a sneaking suspicion that he - or Bianca - had made most of these up on their own, but she's not going to let on how impressed she is by that, of course. That would be just stupid. "Wait - don't tell me, actually. I don't wanna know."

"You're welcome," Paige says smugly, joining him at the pedestal. "Just remember, when you're giving me such a hard time - you have _me_ to thank for your entire existence, now."

"Calm down, Miss Cupid, she's not pregnant yet," Chris grumbles. He nudges her towards the Book. "Besides - we have a more immediate problem to solve."

The Book is lying open on an entry about a demon named Yaelgrath, whatever the hell kind of name that is. Paige has always wondered about that - do they get names from their demon parents? Or do they just make them up one day - wherever it is that demons come from? "Friend of yours?"

"Actually," Chris says, grimacing. Paige has a miniature heart attack, before his face breaks into a smirk. "No. I got you for a second, though."

"You jerk," Paige says, shoving his shoulder. Chris looks immensely pleased with himself, taking her punches like he always does. "Who is it? A problem?"

"A future problem," Chris confirms. He taps the rough drawing on the page, which looks sort of faded, like a lot of the really old entries do. "This guy - he's a time demon. It won't say that in the entry - Cornelia Halliwell, our ancestor who wrote this, left it out on purpose. She was trying to bind him with a time spell of her own, and so she was jumping back and forth between several different years. It didn't work though." Chris pulls out a leather, corded notebook - Bianca's notebook. He keeps all his notes in it, most of which are useless to anyone since they're in a coded form of Spanish. Paige is learning to decipher it with Chris' help, but it's slow going. But the ones that Bianca wrote - even translated - are gibberish anyway, they're so complex. Chris wasn't kidding when he said his girl was a genius. "If you want to summon Prue again next week, we're going to have to vanquish him first. He's been spotted above ground for the first time in years - and his presence on this plane will interfere with the summoning spell, big time."

"Do you think he's here because of you?" Paige asks, with faint alarm. "If he's a time demon, that means he can move back and forth pretty easily, right? Like Tempus? So he might know who you are and why you're here."

"I have no doubt he knows exactly who I am and why I'm here," Chris says darkly. "Which is why I would've needed to vanquish him anyway. And why we can't ask for help from Piper and Phoebe."

"Well, hey now," Paige says, "what is this guy, a Bond villain? We can't walk into a fight with an upper level demon without the Power of Three just because you're afraid he's gonna spill a few secrets."

"He's mid-level, but whatever," Chris replies. "He's not _that_ powerful. And I have a plan."

"Of course you have a plan," Paige mutters.

"We won't need the Power of Three, because you and I are going to fight him at the same time in two different planes," Chris says, flipping open Bianca's notebook to a page near the back, with some sort of diagram sketched in red pencil. "I've been scrying for him all morning, and I'm pretty sure I've pinned him down to two different locations at the same time, on this day - last Monday."

"You can scry...in different _times?_" Paige asks, incredulous.

"I'll teach you how to do it," Chris assures her. "But the more important part is - he was here on this plane, above ground - near a park in Oakland - causing some kind of havoc, I'm sure. And at the same exact time, he was also in the Underworld - because he time travels, he's almost always in two different places at once. So if you and I use one of Bianca's minor time jump spells to go back to last Monday, and we _both_ use a vanquishing potion on him at the same time - one of us up here, and the other in the Underworld…"

"You think it will, what's the word," Paige says, snapping her fingers, "destabilize his timey-wimey hoodoo mojo."

"Technically speaking," Chris says dryly. "One two, problem solved. No reason to involve Piper or Phoebe at all."

"You're a transparent coward, I'm just gonna say that," Paige says wryly, narrowing her eyes at him. Chris shrugs, unapologetic. "What if it doesn't work? What then, huh? Now we have a pissed off time demon who knows all your secrets."

"Then, I use this nifty potion," Chris says, flipping to another page in Bianca's notebook, "and strip his vocal chords right out of his throat. That way when we run to your sisters begging for help, he won't be able to spill our secrets."

Paige gapes at the potion recipe. "Your girlfriend was one scary motherfucker," she tells him, leaning in closer to try and decipher the coded writing. "Is that - am I reading that right? Does that say 'a bluebird's _heart_?'"

"She was raised by a family of assassins, what do you want," Chris says impatiently, flipping the cover shut with a snap. Paige yanks her face back, shooting him a dirty look. "Besides, you can get one of those for like twenty bucks at any seer shop in Chinatown. Come on."

"Oookay, then," Paige says. _Pick your battles, Paige,_ she reminds herself. "You're a scary motherfucker too, you know. So it's not like it was an insult."

"Your insults sound so similar to your compliments, it was just kind of hard to tell," Chris snarks, banishing the notebook back to whatever nifty pocket dimension he keeps it in with a short clap of his hands. He's gonna teach her that one too, he's promised.

"It's part of my charm," Paige assures him.

* * *

So, as plans go, it's not terrible. Plus, Paige kind of likes the idea of vanquishing a demon in two dimensions. And she's always wanted to try Bianca's little time jump spell, ever since Chris told her about it (using ley lines to focus the magic? _So_ nifty!) so it's just crazy and reckless enough that she's definitely, totally gonna do it. It's been a minute since she did something totally irresponsible behind her sisters' backs. Just like the good old days, she figures.

Leo spends the night again, she notices the next day with no small amount of smugness - and even sticks around for breakfast, miracle of all miracles. Chris is off somewhere, making himself scarce - the smartest move, really, to get Piper and Leo in a romantic mood - and Paige doesn't think she's being overly optimistic when she notices them smiling a bit more often than they usually do when they're in the same room. Nowadays it's all drama-rama whenever Leo's around - so many longing looks and thick tension that Paige sometimes feels like she's been dropped into a Jane Austen novel or something. By contrast, breakfast is actually almost...pleasant.

"You've been around a lot lately, the last couple weeks," Piper comments, in her _oh no, I'm not being nosy, I'm just commenting mildly on the weather_ voice. Wyatt babbles something incoherent from her lap, his mouth half-full of a graham cracker bear. "You and Richard aren't fighting or anything, are you?"

"Oh no," Paige says, waving a breezy hand. Leo, sipping coffee quietly at the end of the table, raises one eyebrow, just a fraction. Paige winces inwardly - too much. "He's still in New York, that's all. And that big house gets pretty creepy at night. You guys don't mind, do you? I don't mean to be in your hair all the time."

"Don't be ridiculous," Piper says shortly, rolling her eyes. Leo still doesn't say anything, but his eyes are on Wyatt now, smiling gently as he watches the toddler crush his breakfast into minute crumbs. Paige relaxes, ever so slightly. "I was just wondering, that's all. I haven't even heard from Phoebe in almost a week."

She sounds slightly wistful, just enough that Paige can hear it. Which is Piper-language, says a lot. "I haven't heard from her either," Paige confesses. "I know she and Jason were in Vancouver this weekend for some reason, but they should be back in town by now. Hey - maybe we could have a special dinner," Paige says, perking up. "Invite everybody over, make a night of it."

"Even the boyfriends?" Leo asks amusedly. "The mortal, rich one too?"

"Everybody," Paige says, in her perkiest voice. Piper grins down, shaking her head as she tries futilely to brush the crumbs off of Wyatt's shirt. "Even Chris. A real…" she catches herself before she says 'family dinner.' "...party."

Leo definitely raises his eyebrows at that, but Paige staunchly ignores him, looking straight at Piper. She's the one to work on, Paige knows. And despite what Chris says - the truth is gonna come out eventually. If they keep treating Chris like an annoying stranger, it's only going to make Piper feel worse, when she finds out the truth. "And I suppose I'm the one who will be cooking for this big fancy event?"

"Only if you want," Paige says, shrugging. "I can, you know. Bake stuff. I fry a mean green tomato, you know."

Piper laughs out loud at the lame joke - as she always does, when Paige makes a nerdy reference - but Leo cuts in, frowning gently. Then again, he does everything gently - no wonder he and Chris don't get along. "Chris probably has better things to do than hang out with us. It's not like he's made an effort to be a…_friend,_ or anything."

"He's had a rough time lately," Paige says evenly. She has to be careful not to...show her hand, to look too passionate. But she can't just…_not_defend him, not now. "His fiance _died_, Leo, not even a month ago. And he doesn't have anyone else here that he knows, other than us."

Leo shifts in his seat, a sure sign that she's made a point. "He hasn't exactly been open and honest with us, I don't know that we should - "

"Leo," Piper says suddenly, and Leo falls quiet so abruptly that Paige blinks at the both of them, taken aback. An awkward silence falls, and then Piper smiles, shaking her hair over her shoulder. "Okay. Invite him, Paige. Let him know he's always welcome."

Paige looks between them unsurely, at Piper's uncaring, pleasant smile, and the closed off look on Leo's face - his tense shoulders, jammed into the rickety, small kitchen chair. It reminds Paige of how Chris will look sometimes, when they're arguing about something, or when he's talking about Bianca - a coiled wire of tension, shoved into a too-small space. Those are the kinds of similarities Paige sees, now that she's looking for them.

"Am I missing something?" she asks, never one to beat around the bush.

"Usually," Piper replies, without missing a beat. She hikes Wyatt up further on her lap, busying herself so she can avoid looking anyone in the eye. "We've just decided that - Leo and I - we're going to take Chris for his word, for now. That's all. Give him a _real_ chance, until he proves us wrong."

"Oh, you both decided that, huh?" Paige says, eyeing Leo. He certainly doesn't look like he was a willing participant in that agreement, but he doesn't say anything to contradict it. "Why the change of heart? Did something happen?"

She's looking at Leo, who of course isn't going to say anything - he just keeps sipping his coffee, looking sullen. It's Piper that replies, quiet and thoughtful.

"He wasn't lying about what happened in the future," she says. "I met that girl - Bianca. I saw the way they looked at each other. And I believed him, when he came back through and told us she was dead." She shivers, glancing over at Leo, who doesn't look back at her. "Whatever he saw, whatever he's trying to prevent...maybe all we need to know is that it's terrible. He's telling us the truth about how bad it was, I know that now. Maybe not the whole truth, but - what he does say, it's honest. So let's just...give him some room. Maybe he'll come to us, if we do."

Paige bites her lip, forcing the words she wants to say back down her throat. She thinks about the snippet of conversation she'd heard - what Chris had said to Prue. _She's a good mother - the best._ That kind of faith, you can't fake.

"So, let's invite him to dinner," Piper says, smiling fondly down at Wyatt. "Fry some green tomatoes, Paige. Maybe that'll loosen him up."

"It'll loosen something up, for sure," Leo says, tentatively. His face blooms into a smile when both Paige and Piper laugh, filling the kitchen with the sound.

"I'm kidding about that actually, I don't even know what a green tomato looks like," Paige confesses.

"It's right there in the name!" Piper says, still laughing. Paige joins her, her heart as light as it's been in weeks.

* * *

As it turns out, their good old buddy Yaelgrath is also a skirt chaser, so there's that. They arrive on their appointed Monday, an hour ahead of schedule - Bianca's spell is clever, but not extremely accurate - to find him getting busy with somebody in a public restroom at the outdoor fairgrounds in Oakland. Paige's first instinct is to burst in and save the poor lady, but Chris holds her back.

"It's another demon," he says, grimacing. "It's fine. Buys us time - neither of them will notice we're here. Not until they're...finished, anyway."

"Ugh." Paige wrinkles her nose. "Can we vanquish her too? Two in one sweep?"

"If you want," Chris says, with a careless shrug. "You'll have to wait until ten-forty at least, that's when his past self will arrive in the Underworld. We have to make sure that we're vanquishing him at the same time, otherwise this won't work."

"Who says you get to be the one going to the Underworld?" Paige complains. "Shouldn't it be me? You know - your _elder?_"

"How many times have you been down there?" Chris asks skeptically. "Four, maybe five? Please."

"Hey come on now," Paige says, frowning. "I'm...just as badass as you. I vanquished like, _two_ Sources, buddy, and don't you forget it."

"Sure," Chris says, smirking at her. Though it looks more like a smile, lately. Paige is proud of their progress, overall.

"So, what do we do now? Wait?" Paige asks, sliding her hand into her jacket pocket, checking that the vial of vanquishing potion is still there. A nervous habit.

Chris shrugs, and with a wave of his hand, turns them both invisible. Paige startles, reaching out to grab his arm. He reaches back, sliding up until he's touching her shoulder - a reassuring presence. "Yep."

"Could've warned me first, asshole," Paige grumbles, adjusting to the disorienting feeling of not being able to see your own body. Chris' hand falls away, but she can see his footsteps depressing the leaves, walking towards a bench near a sidewalk. Paige follows - it's close enough to keep an eye on the restroom, but far enough away that they won't have to hear any...sounds. Paige shudders again, just thinking about the possibilities.

They sit there for a moment, just two invisible witches, waiting for a demon's booty call to end. Paige snorts at the thought, and nudges Chris' arm - or at least, what she thinks is his arm. Hard to tell - could just as easily be a shoulder.

"It's seven minutes in hell," she says. "Get it?"

She can swear that she can actually _hear_ him rolling his eyes. "Funny."

"I'm very funny," Paige says proudly. "Piper wants you to come to dinner. By the way."

The silence turns stony. "Oh?" he says, after a long minute.

"Okay, it was technically my idea," she says, "but I swear to God, she was on board with it. Had this whole speech about giving you a real chance - it was very touching."

"And Leo?" Chris asks tensely.

"He...was neutral," Paige concedes. She chews on her lip, keeping her eyes on the bathroom building. This must be perfect for Chris, she thinks wryly - having these conversations when she can't see his face. "Are you ever going to tell me what your deal is with him? I know it's more than the usual 'my dad challenged me to a fight to the death on a Valkyrie island' stuff."

"To be fair, I did exile him there first, so I think I technically started it," Chris says, sounding tired. "I don't think I could tell you the whole thing, Paige. For one thing, it would probably change too much - "

Paige makes the same sound she always does when he pulls that line - a long, loud raspberry. Chris doesn't even pause - used to it at this point.

"And for another," he says stridently, "it's my own problem. I'll get over it, I promise. I just need to...not deal with him as much as possible."

"Sounds healthy," Paige chirps. "Definitely what Prue meant when she told you to give yourself a real chance."

"That's actually not what she said at all," Chris mutters. Paige ignores him.

"I'm just saying," Paige says. The invisibility actually helps, she's unsurprised to find. It's much easier to say these things plainly when it's just your voice, floating around in the air like a ghost. "I don't know what went down in your life, when you were growing up in that future - whatever it is that happened. Whatever terrible apocalypse you had to live through. And I'm not making light of that - I'm not," she assures him, reaching out to fumble for his arm. She lands on his knee instead, and squeezes it. He gives her a full second before shaking her off. "But you're here now. And you told me yourself - time isn't a straight line. You can change the future just by thinking about it. So don't you think you should start working on this stuff, too? Maybe that's part of the problem, Chris - you're hanging onto the pain, instead of facing it, dealing with it. And letting it go."

The silence this time is angry, but Paige expected that. "Thanks," he finally says, curtly. Paige sighs, forlornly.

"Or you can just be angry at him for the rest of eternity, that works too," Paige mutters. "For the record, Chris? I was pissed off at my dad too, for a long time. And it never did me any good. It just made me feel worse."

"Your dad was an accountant," Chris says incredulously. "What did he do - love you too much?"

"He _died,_" Paige spits, her shoulders stiffening. "For your _information._" The silence hangs between them heavily. "And I meant - my birth dad, anyway. Sam. Not my - " Paige bites her lip, guilt striking her right between her eyes. It had just slipped out - referring to Sam as her dad. But it shouldn't have. She _had_ a dad, and his name wasn't Sam.

Sometimes, her old life seems so far away. But it isn't, not really - she's only known the Halliwells for three years. It scares her sometimes, how easy it is to forget who she was before.

"Sorry," Chris mutters, after a long second. Across the park, the door to the bathrooms bangs open, and they both sit up in tandem, the awkwardness falling away instantly. "Showtime," he says, grabbing her arm. Paige rises to her feet, slipping the vial out of her pocket. "Remember - ten-forty. Kill the other one if you want, but you have to wait until I'm in position to vanquish Yaelgrath."

"Yeah, yeah, I got it," Paige grumbles, pushing him away. He orbs away without another word - it's even eerier, to feel the tingle of magic from his orbs but not be able to see them. Paige shakes it off, walking carefully towards the building.

There's no sign of a second demon - Paige can only hear one, muttering loudly to himself in the open doorway of the outhouse. His demonic bimbo must have already shimmered away, Paige figures, finding a good position at the edge of the sidewalk, a good spot to hopefully launch a surprise attack. She wrinkles her nose when the demon finally emerges into plain sight - his pants still unbuckled, his skin a lurid green, he looks like a carnival sideshow. Paige glances nervously around, thanking all the higher powers she can think of that it's a school day, and the park is deserted.

"Come out, come out, wherever you are," Yaelgrath calls, sniffing the air lecherously. Paige shudders. "I know you're there, little witch. I felt your time spell. So nice of you to wait until I was finished."

"Ugh," Paige mutters, beneath her breath. She moves forward cautiously, mindful of her steps. Yaelgrath is still turned in the opposite direction.

"That's the problem with most of the kids these days," Yaelgrath continues, monologuing to himself. "No courtesy. Nobody can wait for anything." He turns, slowly, in Paige's direction, and she freezes in place. "Ah. _Halliwell_ magic," he says, and Paige tenses, sensing the move before he does it. With a great lunge of his hand, a giant energy ball comes hurling in her exact direction. Paige leaps to the side, protecting the vanquishing potion by clutching it to her chest. The ball hits the ground right where she'd just been standing and ignites a pile of dead leaves into a smoldering, green fire.

Not waiting for his next gambit, Paige waves her hand, sending a loose piece of roofing sailing at his head. Unprepared for the attack, it hits him directly in the shoulder, sending him stumbling to the ground. Heart pounding, Paige scrambles to her feet, noticing distantly that the invisibility spell has broken by the jolt of the fall. She sends another piece of debris - a rock from the landscaping by the playground - hurtling at his face. Yaelgrath shimmers away just in time, reappearing a few feet away, his face lurid with rage.

"It's been a minute or two since I had a Halliwell," he sneers, his eyes landing directly on Paige's chest. She swallows, feeling slightly nauseous. "So nice of you to dress up for the occasion."

"Oh, that is _it,_" Paige says, and orbs another rock, this time from the opposite direction. It hits him directly in the back of the head, sending him to the ground again, this time with a roar of rage.

She ducks behind the wall of the building to avoid his answering attack - another spray of energy balls, black and green, scorching the pavement around her cover. Frantically, she looks at her watch - ten-thirty nine. It'll have to be good enough, she figures, and orbs away, reappearing a few feet behind him.

She can tell now what Chris meant by low-level - he relies heavily on his powers, with no real thought to back it up. All strength and no strategy. His anger also distracts him - makes him sloppy. Paige stands there for a brief second, watching him hurl energy balls at the spot where she's no longer standing - yelling in rage, completely oblivious to the doom standing right behind him. Smirking, Paige lobs the potion at his feet, watching in satisfaction as it begins to bubble, tendrils of steam working their way up his legs and tangling around him in a smoky ring of power.

He whirls around, caught, eyes wild. She looks him in the eye and says, "this one's for Cornelia. Fucking creep."

He goes up in green, rotten flames. It's pretty satisfying, even if it does stink to high heaven.

Chris orbs in, not even a full minute after the final death wail, visible again himself. He spares a quick glance for the green ash that once was Yaelgrath, then turns to give her a tentative smile. "Good work. I think we did it."

"You vanquished him too?" Paige checks her watch - ten forty-two. She breathes out in relief. "You think it worked?"

"I'll scry for him when we get home, but...yeah, I think it worked." He looks back over at the pile of ash. "I'm pretty sure if it didn't, we'd know by now. He's not the subtle type, I'm sure you noticed. He'd come back at us right away."

They stand there in silence for a minute, waiting for a lecherous green demon to pop out of the trees and start throwing energy balls at them, but nothing happens. Just the breeze of late fall, and the faint sounds of the highway from the other side of the park. Paige smiles in satisfaction.

"That was kind of fun," she comments. "Apart from the gross stuff. We should do this more often - like a bonding experience thing."

"Funny," Chris comments, "but you never seemed all that hyped to go out vanquishing with me before. 'Great big nag,' I believe were the words used."

"I meant that with affection," Paige says. She walks over and claps him on the shoulder, trying to express her forgiveness for their earlier tension through her smile. It seems to work, judging by the one she gets in return - hesitant, but genuine. He's trying, she knows. "So - we're still in last Monday, right?"

"Whatever you're thinking - no," Chris says firmly.

"It's nothing bad! Just a teeny tiny bad hair day timeline change - seriously nothing big - "

"No, are you kidding me?" Chris shakes her hand off. "You're impossible."

"Thanks," Paige says, grinning up at him.

* * *

She can't get a solid commitment out of Chris on dinner, but she's pretty sure he'll show up, if for no other reason than he knows she'll make him pay for it if he doesn't. But he makes himself _really_ scarce in the days leading up to - probably gearing himself up, Paige thinks with sympathy. She leaves him to it.

Piper does end up cooking, which surprises nobody. Paige makes a valiant effort to help, but is banished to the kitchen table after she ruins the third acorn squash. How exactly one can ruin a squash by cutting it wrong, she doesn't know, but Piper's the boss. Whatever.

"What time did Phoebe say to orb over?" Leo asks, calling in from the living room. He and Wyatt are watching The Flintstones, and Paige is ninety-nine percent sure that he spent the night here again. She can't be completely certain, since she's been sleeping at Richard's again to give them space, but that's _definitely_ the same shirt he had on yesterday.

"For the hundredth time," Piper yells back, laughing, "six-thirty!"

"Okay, I just don't wanna interrupt anything!" Leo yells in reply. "You know like that time when she told me six and I showed up at six and she was doing you know what with you know who on the you know where - "

"Oh my God, Leo," Piper says, laughing into her saucepan. Paige is giggling herself, muffling it with one hand. "You know how many years ago that was? Five. Five years, and he's still bringing it up like it was yesterday - "

"So just confirming - it's six-_thirty_?" Leo yells again. He's definitely doing it on purpose.

"She has assured me multiple times that she will not be you-know-what-ing at six-thirty," Piper yells back.

"Okay, thanks," Leo calls. Piper makes a face at the doorway, and Paige laughs helplessly, charmed despite herself.

"You know, for a divorced couple you sure are pretty cute," she says slyly. Piper points a knife at her playfully. "Just sayin'."

"Yeah, you've been 'just saying' a lot, lately, huh," Piper says dryly. "Don't think I haven't noticed what you're doing, missy. You think you're getting away with it, but you're not."

_If you only knew, sis,_ Paige thinks dryly. Guilt curdles, just a little, in her stomach, but she ignores it. "Is this the part where you rake me across the coals for daring to hope that you'll get back together with the love of your life? Because I'm ready for it, boss. Hang me out to dry for my heinous crime!"

"Stop," Piper says, but she's smiling. "It's…"

"Yeeeees?" Paige says, dipping the word low and suggestive. Piper hides a blush behind a cupboard door, and Paige grins.

"We've been talking through some things." Piper shuts the cupboard with a snap, her face suspiciously, suddenly composed. "I'm not saying anything, one way or the other! But...it's a long time coming. The talks."

"Good," Paige says, sincerely. "I'm glad, Piper. Honest."

Piper smiles, a bit shy, and busies herself with the cooking again. The trick with Piper is to catch her unawares - that's when she really lets her guard down.

Chris is the same. Speaking of. "So," Paige says, "should we prepare for fireworks tonight, do you think?"

"Actually," Piper says, "he came by this morning. Chris, I mean." She looks up at Paige, her eyes suddenly sharp. Almost suspicious, if Paige isn't being too paranoid. "He and Leo talked for awhile out in the garden. I don't know what it was about - neither of them would say - but Leo seemed to be in a good mood afterwards."

"Maybe they made a suicide pact," Paige suggests cheerfully. Piper snorts.

"He's been dropping by recently, just to check in," Piper says. "It's...weird. Nice. Weird and nice."

He hadn't told her he was going to do that, Paige marvels. Something like pride unfurls in her chest - a warm feeling. "Is that why you changed your mind? Give him a real chance, and all that?"

Piper shrugs. "Do you ever get the feeling…" she starts, trailing off into silence again. Paige waits, her heart in her throat.

"What?"

"I dunno. Just lately, I've been looking at Chris and feeling like - " Piper cuts off abruptly, shaking her head. "It's silly. I don't know."

"No, what?" Paige prods. "Tell me."

"Like something's different," Piper concludes, setting her spatula down. She cocks her head curiously. "Like something's...changed."

_The act of observing,_ Paige thinks. "Yeah," she says. "Yeah, I know what you mean."

Piper makes a face, returning back to her sauce. "Just mumbo jumbo stuff," she mutters, laughing a little. "I sound like Pheebs."

There are so many things Paige wishes she could say. _I met your big sister,_ she'd tell Piper. _I'm so sorry that I'm not going to tell you, but I don't want to break your heart anymore than it already is right now, there's only so much one person can handle, isn't there? Your son is incredible. He's sharp and fast and ruthless, and yeah maybe a little messed up, maybe he does things the wrong way sometimes and he's got PTSD leaking out of his ears and he doesn't value his own life, but I'm working on that, and so are you, only you don't know you're doing it. We live in four dimensions, but really there's more like eleven, did you know that? And love is one of them. That's the only dimension that matters. And I think I've finally figured out how to see it._

"You," Paige says instead, "just sound like a witch. You've got the cauldron and everything right there."

"I suppose I do," Piper says, peering over the big pot on the back burner, simmering quietly. "How's it go? 'Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble.'"

Paige laughs. Piper does the best spooky voices - Wyatt loves it, bursts into hysterics every single time. "If this weren't such a respectable neighborhood, we'd so be the creepy house on the corner that all the kids are afraid of."

"There's still time," Piper says, grinning. "Anything could happen in the future."

"You got that right," Paige says dryly.

* * *

Dinner goes extremely well; there is nobody at the table who isn't surprised. Chris eats very little, but spends most of the evening in deep conversation with Piper, apparently about cooking techniques, of all things. Every time Paige looks over at him, she's struck dumb by the look on his face - a sort of wonder, an awe that makes her want to burst into tears right there in front of everybody. So she doesn't look over that often.

Phoebe's brought Jason, who does what he always does whenever he encounters the family at-large - doesn't talk much, and laughs at everyone's jokes. He's definitely on the top five of their favorite Phoebe Boyfriends, just for that. And Leo - to his credit - keeps his mouth shut too - occupying himself with Wyatt, at the opposite end of the table from Chris. They also manage to clear the table at the same time without so much as a glare, and Paige even spots them chatting - companionably! Sort of! - in the kitchen as they load the dishwasher.

"Did I miss something?" Phoebe mutters, accosting Paige in the corridor, as Jason joins the rest of the men on clean up duty. "Are Chris and Leo…_buds_ now?"

Paige squeezes Phoebe's wrist. "They're working on it," she whispers. "It's a nice night - just go with it."

Phoebe frowns in the direction of the kitchen, her face heating visibly as Leo looks up from his conversation with Jason to say something to Piper, swinging a fussy Wyatt in the doorway. "God," mutters Phoebe. "I forget, when I'm away, how much they love each other." She fans her face. "I can't believe I'm the only one who can feel that!"

"You're not," Paige assures her, grinning. Phoebe grins back, the mood infectious. It's been like that all night.

It's not as if Paige thinks it'll change overnight, or anything. Chris still winces at loud noises, and there were a few comments that are on the...not-so-nice side, mostly from Phoebe and Leo's side of the table. Piper refuses to set Wyatt down, even for a second - she held him all throughout dinner, and Paige realizes for the first time that she's been doing that for awhile - stubbornly keeping him in her lap, even when his high chair is right there. All of them tense up, every time the wind hits the side of the house a little too loud and makes the rafters creak. And none of them are being completely honest. Chris might have the biggest secrets of them all - but none of them are innocent, on that front. You lie to your family more than you lie to anyone else - it's a type of love, Paige has always thought. You trust them enough to hurt them, which she knows doesn't make much sense. But it's true. You beat them up because you know they'll stick around afterwards. Test them, to make sure they always come back.

When Paige finally makes her escape, Chris is still there - lingering in the kitchen, still talking to Piper about knives and forks and saucepans or whatever. She can hear Leo, singing softly to Wyatt in the bedroom upstairs, as she quietly makes her way up to the attic. Phoebe and Jason are already gone, but their presence lingers in the house - the gifts they'd brought from Canada scattered between tables and bedrooms, the echo of their laughter still ringing in Paige's ears. It was a nice night - a good night. Paige feels...dare she say it? _Hopeful._

They'd agreed - she and Chris - that she should be alone. The person performing the summoning is anchored by the spell, but a second presence destabilizes it - like Paige had done, that first night. She'd felt guilty - taking up one of the nights, depriving Chris of a conversation with her, but he'd insisted.

"She's your sister," he just kept saying, and Paige couldn't deny the truth of that. Even if that truth was a little...iffy. 'Complicated,' is the better term, maybe. But what isn't, nowadays?

The spell itself is simple: nothing Paige can't handle. The ingredients are the difficult part, really - and the timing. She has to wait until the exact strike of midnight to lay the salt down, and each candle is lit one hour apart - to the second - until she gets to the fifth hour, which is when she speaks the incantation. The hardest part is the waiting in-between - hoping she doesn't get interrupted, trying not to fall asleep. She doesn't know how Chris pulled this off right under their noses every month - she really doesn't.

But it's worth it, for that fresh second when Prue appears - a blush in her cheeks, a smile on her face. Her fatigue and anxiety melt away, like they were never even there. Paige smiles back, relieved that it worked. Relieved, and somehow...ready. She's been waiting all her life for this moment, even when she didn't know it. Now, she knows what she's going to say.

"Hi," Prue greets, her voice a little distorted somehow, like she's speaking through a long tunnel. But she looks much more solid than she had last time, and Chris had warned her about that, anway - that the sound might be a little funky. A side effect of her ingredients, he said. "You found me."

"Yes, I did," Paige says, her voice trembling. "I'm sorry it's me, instead of Chris. You probably wanted to talk to him, but I just - "

"I want to talk to you, too," Prue says earnestly, her brows pulling together. She's wearing a black top, pulled together into a Y below her neck, and red leather pants. Her hair is long and silky, styled, and her makeup is a bit flashy. Like she's on her way out to a night at the club. "I always wanna talk to you, Paige, even when we're fighting. You know that."

Paige is lost for words for a second. Chris had warned her about that, too - how she might reference something that had never happened, at least not in their timeline. She still wasn't completely...ready for it, though.

"Yeah." She clears her throat. "How long do we have? Can you tell?"

Prue frowns a little in thought. "Quite a bit, I think." She flexes her arms a little, looking curiously around the attic. "You're very strong. You can keep me together just as long as Chris can - maybe longer, if we both try."

Paige loses her breath again, clutching Bianca's notebook in her hands. She looks down at it, trying to compose herself and not just blubber all over the place before she can even ask a single question.

"I have...so many things to say," she says finally. When she looks back up, Prue is waiting patiently, smiling kindly. "I didn't tell Piper and Phoebe. I don't know that I ever will. Because you're not...really _their _sister, and…"

"They wouldn't like it," Prue finishes for her, shaking her head. "They miss me too much, they knew me too well. They'd think it was...perverse."

Paige swallows back her tears. "Right," she chokes out. "Do you - do you know why they can't summon her? Their Prue?"

Prue nods solemnly. "They'll find her when they're ready," she says simply.

"Oh." Paige nods, rolling that over in her head. "Okay."

Prue tilts her head. It's strange, now that Paige is seeing her up close - that distance she'd noticed before, it's almost more of a delay. Like Prue is being...filtered through something, somehow. A skip in the tape. "You summoned me to talk about Chris, though," Prue says, curious. "You know most of the truth now, right? And you think I can help you help him."

"I know you can," Paige says. "And God knows he doesn't want to help himself."

Prue snorts. "Tell me about it."

Paige grins, an intense burst of emotion making her hands shake as she unwinds the cord around Bianca's notebook. "I have - well, Chris gave me Bianca's notes. You know - you know what happened to Bianca. Right?" Prue's face turns endlessly sad, and she nods. "Right. Okay, so - obviously, Chris is not...really feeling the light of hope right about now, and while - I'm working on it, and I'm making progress, honest - I think we need - "

"A plan," Prue says, nodding. "A plan to save them _both._"

"Yes," Paige says, finding the right page. On it, is a passage written by Bianca in her dense, tricky coded language, and Paige has spent all week translating it with as little help from Chris as she could spare. He probably knows which page she was working on, but it's a testament to the deepening trust between them that he didn't call her out on it. "He hasn't told me what we're saving Wyatt from. But I don't know that that matters - it's evil, right? Whatever it is: it's just evil. Something we know."

Prue's face twists, but she nods again, her ghostly earrings jangling silently against the sides of her chin.

"But what we're saving Chris from is harder," Paige says. "We're saving him from...giving up, I guess. Despair. That's less straightforward." She looks down at the notebook, the most private of private notes, from one lover to another. It had made Paige ache to read it, bit by bit, each word revealing a painful whole as she translated it. A goodbye, and a good luck. Whoever Bianca was - really was, beneath the mask they'd seen, during that brief encounter - Paige can't wait to meet her. To get to know her, for real. "And I think I need your help. So I don't say the wrong thing - push him too far. You know?"

Prue is looking down at the notebook too, her hands clasped lightly beneath her chin. She flickers a little as Paige looks at her, but she doesn't change her appearance - it's just the edges, that fade in and out. "Yeah, I know what you mean. But you're doing that already, Paige. You have to see that - you all are."

Paige bites her lip, looking at the last sentence of the passage. Translated, it reads: _I'll find you again, when it's over. Even if we don't know each other, it'll be worth it. We'll get to do it all over again._ She'd signed it as "your friend." Paige doesn't know that she's ever read anything as desperately romantic, or that she ever will - even if she lives another hundred years.

"You can't convince someone to want to live," Prue says, "you already know that. The will comes from within. But Chris has it - he's just lost in the darkness, right now. He's been lost for a long, long time - but we're a family of Whitelighters, Paige. If anybody can light the way, it's us."

Paige smiles. "Did you marry one too?" she teases. "In one of your nine lives?"

Prue grins. "Once or twice," she says, "and it was a lot more than nine, I'll tell you that." Paige laughs, surprising herself with the sound.

"I knew we'd get along," Paige mutters, wiping her tears away. Her smile feels so big that it could almost break her face in half. "Every time they talk about you - that's what I think - 'we'd be such good friends.'"

"We were," Prue says, reaching out one palm. She holds aloft, in-between them, right at the edge of the summoning circle. "We were, and we are, and we will be. Remember that, Paige: time is a circle. It's gonna be important later."

Paige holds her own hand up to match, lining her palm up with Prue's, only a few inches of air between them. She nods breathlessly.

Prue lets her hand fall. When she does, Paige notices that her appearance has changed - she's a young girl, no older than sixteen. She's wearing a heavy cargo jacket, and she has braces on her teeth. But her eyes are the same - sharp, pale green. The only spot of color.

"So," Prue says, her voice higher, but no less authoritative. "You wanna plan? Let's plan. We've got some nephews to save, and I don't have all night, here."

Paige wipes away her tears, and flips to a blank sheet. "Ready when you are," she says.


End file.
